Climate Change (G8 Summit) — 29 Jun 2005 at 18:50

This division occurred at the end of a Liberal Democrat opposition day. The Liberal Democrat front bench proposed the following motion:

This House recognises the serious threat posed to the planet by climate change; welcomes the decision of the Prime Minister to make this a priority for the UK presidency of the G8; notes with concern however the lack of progress being made to secure effective international agreement on the way forward and in particular the wrecking tactics of the present US Administration and the total lack of leverage on this issue by the Prime Minister over President Bush, who is still in public denial of even the basic science; believes that carbon emissions need to be cut by at least 60 per cent. by 2050; further believes that without such action, measures to reduce poverty in developing countries will be severely undermined; calls on the Prime Minister to use the G8 to win support for a successor regime to Kyoto based upon the principle of contraction and convergence, engaging the participation of both developed and developing nations; further believes that he will be in a stronger position to give an international lead if he now tackles his failures in domestic climate change policy, which mean that the UK is now virtually certain to miss its 2010 carbon emissions reduction target and is now in danger of missing even its Kyoto target; and urges him in particular to adopt effective policies to conserve energy within the domestic sector, and to cut emissions within the transport and energy sectors.

The Government front bench moved an amendment to replace the text of the motion with:

This House welcomes the UK's global leadership on climate change and in particular the Prime Minister's decision to make climate change one of the top two priorities for the G8 Presidency and a priority for the EU Presidency; recognises that UK initiatives in 2005 have already made important contributions to the international debate on future climate change policy, in particular the scientific conference on stabilisation in February 2005 and the Energy and Environment Ministerial Roundtable in March 2005; looks forward to the Gleneagles Summit and provides its full support to the Prime Minister's continuing efforts to secure a successful outcome; commends the UK's plans to continue to strive for further international action following Gleneagles through both the G8 and EU; further commends the Labour Party for being the only party to commit in its manifesto to a national goal to reduce emissions by 20 per cent. by 2010; celebrates the UK's achievement in already reducing emissions to 13.4 per cent. between the base year and 2003, beyond that required by the Kyoto Protocol; further welcomes the introduction of policies such as the climate change levy and renewables obligation that have been so important in achieving this; and looks forward to the publication of the climate change programme later this year which will set out further policies to deliver the goal of a 20 per cent. reduction in emissions by 2010.

The question before the House was whether the original wording should remain. Those voting Aye were voting to support the original motion and to reject the amendment. Those voting No were voting to reject the original motion although not necessarily supporting the amendment. In fact, once the original wording was rejected, the amendment was agreed without a further division.

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